Algorithm for polygon faceting for polyhedral finite elements
This issue was created automatically from an original Mantis Issue. Further discussion may take place here.
This is a request for a minor(?) alter in a VTK rendering algorithm.
Polyhedral finite elements are reaching a level of numerical maturity where their use is likely to become widespread -- and correspondingly an increased desire to display them in ParaView. For convex polygonal faces of a polyhedron, the VTK algorithms work fine, and omitting the interior triangle edges was a nice rendering improvement.
However, the discrete numerical algorithms that have emerged surprisingly work for polyhedrons that have the "star property." Long story told short, the attached ParaView figure in the right hand panel contains a polyhedral finite element that has a non-planar, concave polygonal face. Numerically, this polyhedral configuration works very well.
Would it be possible for rendering purposes, to create the polygon's triangular sub-facets by starting with the polygon's vertex closest to the average coordinate of the polygon's vertex nodal points? Maybe this particular polygon vertex becomes a "common" vertex for all of the sub-triangles?
Samuel W. Key FMA Development, LLC (Sandia contractor)